6 ms·

Modern Americans suck at building and maintaining community. Everyone wants to play in the sandbox but no one wants to rake it.

ethbr0 5y ago
I would counter that modern America sucks for supporting communities. Our policies are mostly geared around creating never-ending strip malls, endless suburban neighborhoods, and omnipresent traffic issues. Because these things most efficiently create tax revenue, happy "what my parents had" families, and income segregated areas. Similar to college, fixing America starts with deciding that everyone doesn't need a single family home in a popular metro.
- epicureanideal 5y ago
  The problem isn’t that people are wanting too much. It’s that getting on the property ladder at all, even a small condo in a metro where there are jobs, is becoming far, far more difficult than for previous generations. And of course, if people need to work longer and harder to achieve what would've been considered fairly modest goals by (recent) previous generations in terms of housing, then they have less time and energy to devote to friendship and community.
  - ethbr0 5y ago
    My personal read is that a huge amount of that in the last decade or so has been a consequence of basement central bank rates. When vast sums of institutional money are freed and chasing yield, eventually some of it leaks into residential property. And when a market that was precariously balanced with only retail buyers (due to density opposition and building economics) now has equal or more investors pile in? Well, prices do what they've done.
    - Ericson2314 5y ago
      If we lower them we have no homes, if we raise them we have no jobs. The fact of the matter is conventional central banking is a failure, as is widespread private homeownership in metropolitan areas.
      - ethbr0 5y ago
        Well, conventional central banking usually has the goals of "prevent another Great Depression" and "keep inflation under control." In that respect, they've been fairly successful. The side effects are... less good. But worse than a national depression? Eh.
        Ericson2314 5y ago
        https://jwmason.org/slackwire/at-jacobin-the-fed-doesnt-work-for-you/ https://jwmason.org/slackwire/at-jacobin-the-fed-doesnt-work... well start with those side effects: inflation is kept in check by beating back workers whenever they get to powerful. Then take into account how lousy growth has been since the 1970s when they started doing that. If we could have had depressions but more amortized growth, and not "jobless recoveries" and anemic amortized growth, would that have been worse or better?
        imtringued 5y ago
        That's why they changed the inflation target. If your goal is 2% then you have to raise rates before you even hit 2% nipping full employment in the bud. If you target an average rate of 2% then having a year with 5% and four with less than 2% lets you balance things out. Edit: I read the article and it basically boils down to rich people benefiting from low inflation because it doesn't erode their deposits and makes stocks/housing go up without increasing wages. It's pretty much true but it is also so obvious to be boring. Money from the past is power from the past. Maintaining the value of money earned 60 years ago is the same as maintaining power obtained 60 years ago. Holding onto money doesn't help workers be more productive so if they spent their 60 year old money it would get eroded by inflation. You therefore need to add some slack in the labor supply that is not used up by anyone, meaning nobody is going to miss that labor if it is paid by 60 year old dollars that would otherwise result in inflation if there were full employment.
    - imtringued 5y ago
      > My personal read is that a huge amount of that in the last decade or so has been a consequence of basement central bank rates. The central bank doesn't decide the interest rate, rather it is closer to an autonomous organization whose goal is to let interest rates follow the economy. Low interest rates are the result of the preference to hold deposits and the preference to not take on debt. If you want higher interest rates you'll have to raise the government debt ceiling or kill deposits with inflation/negative interest rates on deposits. Considering the demand for perpetual savings it only makes sense that governments would issue perpetual bonds. The reason why perpetual bonds are interesting is that they only have to be paid back when they have to be paid back.
- UnpossibleJim 5y ago
  As unpopular as this might be to say, and as environmentally unfriendly as it is, I've known my neighbors in every house I lived in; even when my friends and I rented a house in college, and after I was done with college, and I've rented houses with friends. They weren't always thrilled to see renters move in, but when we mowed the grass or were grilling, etc. you're forced to look over the fence and say "hey". Apartments offer a sense of odd anonymity, where very few know each other unless they already do, for some reason, especially in more urban areas. I was never more anonymous than when I lived in a city proper, living in an apartment building. The only people who knew my name were my coworkers. EDIT... atrocious grammar
  - ethbr0 5y ago
    One thing I've been confused about, from the time I've visited friends and (briefly) lived in big box condo / apartment buildings... why aren't there more community spaces? And no, I don't mean "the pool" or "the weight room." I mean actual lounge areas. Social areas. Hell, even Marriott's Residence Inns do a better job than your average building.
    - jbay808 5y ago
      Agreed. I'd love to see more apartment buildings have bakeries, cafes, or other public spaces on the ground floor. Then you can get to know not only your neighbours in your own apartment building, but in shared spaces for the surrounding areas too.
      - ben_w 5y ago
        My apartment (in Germany, not USA) has that. I hope it reopens after the pandemic.
        pantalaimon 5y ago
        That's unfortunately only true for old (100+ years) buildings, most newer developments don't have commercial space in the ground floor.
- kiba 5y ago
  Our policies are mostly geared around creating never-ending strip malls, endless suburban neighborhoods, and omnipresent traffic issues. Because these things most efficiently create tax revenue, happy "what my parents had" families, and income segregated areas. I doubt that they are most efficient at generating tax revenue, especially when considering density and infrastructure maintenance.
  - Ericson2314 5y ago
    Yes that is true. They are worse on all counts in the medium-long term but we do it anyways.
  - addicted 5y ago
    They are definitely significantly worse at generating tax revenue. Mixed housing along with ground level commercial spaces even in the poorest of downtown districts generate more tax revenue. The problem is when crime and other forms of blight lead to people not living or working in those places anymore.
    - ethbr0 5y ago
      It's a tricky argument to say they're better at generating tax revenue, if only people changed their habits and preferences... ;)
- imtringued 5y ago
  >Because these things most efficiently create tax revenue, You mean tax revenue because there are subsidies for new developments? Car based suburban sprawl is a money pit for tax revenue. You need a lot of road per house.
Mountain_Skies 5y ago
Robert Putnam has studied this extensively but his findings weren't politically correct so he hid them for quite some time. Once he finally did release them, he discovered his fears were well founded, as he was villainized for his research. So we will continue to roam around searching for the cause while ignoring what's already in front of us because we simply don't want it to be true or are too fearful of what recognizing it would mean.

ethbr0 5y ago

I would counter that modern America sucks for supporting communities. Our policies are mostly geared around creating never-ending strip malls, endless suburban neighborhoods, and omnipresent traffic issues. Because these things most efficiently create tax revenue, happy "what my parents had" families, and income segregated areas. Similar to college, fixing America starts with deciding that everyone doesn't need a single family home in a popular metro.

epicureanideal 5y ago
The problem isn’t that people are wanting too much. It’s that getting on the property ladder at all, even a small condo in a metro where there are jobs, is becoming far, far more difficult than for previous generations. And of course, if people need to work longer and harder to achieve what would've been considered fairly modest goals by (recent) previous generations in terms of housing, then they have less time and energy to devote to friendship and community.
- ethbr0 5y ago
  My personal read is that a huge amount of that in the last decade or so has been a consequence of basement central bank rates. When vast sums of institutional money are freed and chasing yield, eventually some of it leaks into residential property. And when a market that was precariously balanced with only retail buyers (due to density opposition and building economics) now has equal or more investors pile in? Well, prices do what they've done.
  - Ericson2314 5y ago
    If we lower them we have no homes, if we raise them we have no jobs. The fact of the matter is conventional central banking is a failure, as is widespread private homeownership in metropolitan areas.
    - ethbr0 5y ago
      Well, conventional central banking usually has the goals of "prevent another Great Depression" and "keep inflation under control." In that respect, they've been fairly successful. The side effects are... less good. But worse than a national depression? Eh.
      - Ericson2314 5y ago
        https://jwmason.org/slackwire/at-jacobin-the-fed-doesnt-work-for-you/ https://jwmason.org/slackwire/at-jacobin-the-fed-doesnt-work... well start with those side effects: inflation is kept in check by beating back workers whenever they get to powerful. Then take into account how lousy growth has been since the 1970s when they started doing that. If we could have had depressions but more amortized growth, and not "jobless recoveries" and anemic amortized growth, would that have been worse or better?
        imtringued 5y ago
        That's why they changed the inflation target. If your goal is 2% then you have to raise rates before you even hit 2% nipping full employment in the bud. If you target an average rate of 2% then having a year with 5% and four with less than 2% lets you balance things out. Edit: I read the article and it basically boils down to rich people benefiting from low inflation because it doesn't erode their deposits and makes stocks/housing go up without increasing wages. It's pretty much true but it is also so obvious to be boring. Money from the past is power from the past. Maintaining the value of money earned 60 years ago is the same as maintaining power obtained 60 years ago. Holding onto money doesn't help workers be more productive so if they spent their 60 year old money it would get eroded by inflation. You therefore need to add some slack in the labor supply that is not used up by anyone, meaning nobody is going to miss that labor if it is paid by 60 year old dollars that would otherwise result in inflation if there were full employment.
  - imtringued 5y ago
    > My personal read is that a huge amount of that in the last decade or so has been a consequence of basement central bank rates. The central bank doesn't decide the interest rate, rather it is closer to an autonomous organization whose goal is to let interest rates follow the economy. Low interest rates are the result of the preference to hold deposits and the preference to not take on debt. If you want higher interest rates you'll have to raise the government debt ceiling or kill deposits with inflation/negative interest rates on deposits. Considering the demand for perpetual savings it only makes sense that governments would issue perpetual bonds. The reason why perpetual bonds are interesting is that they only have to be paid back when they have to be paid back.
UnpossibleJim 5y ago
As unpopular as this might be to say, and as environmentally unfriendly as it is, I've known my neighbors in every house I lived in; even when my friends and I rented a house in college, and after I was done with college, and I've rented houses with friends. They weren't always thrilled to see renters move in, but when we mowed the grass or were grilling, etc. you're forced to look over the fence and say "hey". Apartments offer a sense of odd anonymity, where very few know each other unless they already do, for some reason, especially in more urban areas. I was never more anonymous than when I lived in a city proper, living in an apartment building. The only people who knew my name were my coworkers. EDIT... atrocious grammar
- ethbr0 5y ago
  One thing I've been confused about, from the time I've visited friends and (briefly) lived in big box condo / apartment buildings... why aren't there more community spaces? And no, I don't mean "the pool" or "the weight room." I mean actual lounge areas. Social areas. Hell, even Marriott's Residence Inns do a better job than your average building.
  - jbay808 5y ago
    Agreed. I'd love to see more apartment buildings have bakeries, cafes, or other public spaces on the ground floor. Then you can get to know not only your neighbours in your own apartment building, but in shared spaces for the surrounding areas too.
    - ben_w 5y ago
      My apartment (in Germany, not USA) has that. I hope it reopens after the pandemic.
      - pantalaimon 5y ago
        That's unfortunately only true for old (100+ years) buildings, most newer developments don't have commercial space in the ground floor.
kiba 5y ago
Our policies are mostly geared around creating never-ending strip malls, endless suburban neighborhoods, and omnipresent traffic issues. Because these things most efficiently create tax revenue, happy "what my parents had" families, and income segregated areas. I doubt that they are most efficient at generating tax revenue, especially when considering density and infrastructure maintenance.
- Ericson2314 5y ago
  Yes that is true. They are worse on all counts in the medium-long term but we do it anyways.
- addicted 5y ago
  They are definitely significantly worse at generating tax revenue. Mixed housing along with ground level commercial spaces even in the poorest of downtown districts generate more tax revenue. The problem is when crime and other forms of blight lead to people not living or working in those places anymore.
  - ethbr0 5y ago
    It's a tricky argument to say they're better at generating tax revenue, if only people changed their habits and preferences... ;)
imtringued 5y ago
>Because these things most efficiently create tax revenue, You mean tax revenue because there are subsidies for new developments? Car based suburban sprawl is a money pit for tax revenue. You need a lot of road per house.

Mountain_Skies 5y ago

Robert Putnam has studied this extensively but his findings weren't politically correct so he hid them for quite some time. Once he finally did release them, he discovered his fears were well founded, as he was villainized for his research. So we will continue to roam around searching for the cause while ignoring what's already in front of us because we simply don't want it to be true or are too fearful of what recognizing it would mean.